Check out time

[merryeccentricities]

Joly looks over the last few sets of readings and nods, satisfied. "You seem to be recovering well, Monsieur. If you'll promise to follow a few instructions and trust yourself to your daughter's care, I think you can move back to your own rooms today."

Comments

[heartbeneathastone]

Marius is only a step or two beside, though he slows and stops beside Joly. But he sounds fairly warm-- at least by Pontmercy standards-- as he says, "Good day, father. You look well indeed-- for which we owe you much thanks, I am sure," he adds, turning to Joly.

[road_to_calvary]

He beams at them, and says to Cosette, 'you do not have to insist any longer.'

He kisses her, and grasps Marius's arm by way of greeting.

'Good morning, my children. Ah, what a sight you are for an old man.'

[lark_in_flight]

How silly, that the relief of that statement should make her almost want to weep again! She doesn't; she masters herself, and only closes her eyes for a moment at the dear familiar kiss on her cheek, and gives Joly a look of openly glad gratitude afterwards with her hand on her father's shoulder.

[merryeccentricities]

Joly reaches up to press Marius' shoulder for a moment, and meets Cosette's look with a warm smile. "I'm so glad you could come to us here." You, plural, all of them. "And I hope you'll be willing to see more of me, because I'm going to be coming by to check on you--" he nods to Valjean "-- for the next five days. But if you rest and listen to your daughter, Monsieur, I'm sure you'll be able to banish doctors from your company in no more time than that." He raises a hand in warning. "Argue with us, and you'll be cursed with my company for a fortnight."

He says it lightly, mostly teasing, but...really, though. Let your family take care of you, Valjean.

[road_to_calvary]

Five days? He feels internally alarmed - just for a second - but outwardly smiles.

'I am sure there is no need to bother you further, monsieur. I will rest if that is the instruction, you need not waste further time.'

He is not arguing! Really! It is just that he has Cosette, and surely anyone can see that is all the medicine he needs.

[heartbeneathastone]

"Monsieur Joly knows his business," Marius says. "We would do best to mind him, I am sure."

[lark_in_flight]

"You had better listen to me," Cosette tells him firmly -- and it's a joke, light teasing, except for how it isn't really, not at all. "Or else I shall be quite angry! To me and to this kind doctor. You shall rest and take care of yourself, and worry about nothing at all."

To Joly, "My father has rooms here, and so do we. We'll be here as long as necessary to be quite certain he's on the mend."

[road_to_calvary]

Ah, now he is inconveniencing them. Of course he is pleased at her words but they can be just words, she does not have to live by them.

'Children, you need not stay. You have your lives to live - come and see me a little, and I will remain until I am well, you need not give up the comforts of home.'

Really, all he needs is to know she will come back, and that he might see her.

'I promise I will worry about nothing.'

This is a lie, because there are still the things she says she knows. But he does not want to think of them yet, and if she does not broach it then he will not.

[heartbeneathastone]

"We would have no lives at all without you," Marius says, softly but fervently. "You think there is anything we would not give up? And even if it were not so, staying here is no sacrifice at all."

[lark_in_flight]

Cosette turns back to Joly, as if her father hadn't said a thing.

She won't listen to him say such things, as if none of this had happened, as if he hasn't heard a word she's said at all. But she won't argue with him now, not here in front of kind M. Joly. It's not right to have a family disagreement in a public place, it's not fair to anyone, but if she tries to talk to her father about this at all she won't keep her composure.

So instead, she says earnestly, "Certainly we'll stay and look after him. Visit a little! We shall come ever so often. My father's rooms are upstairs. Do you think he's strong enough to move to them? I'm sure it's more comfortable, but it's whatever you think best, monsieur."

[merryeccentricities]

​Joly is officially professionally totally unaware of any unspoken family discussion happening, while at the same time having to pay close attention to the reactions his patient has to the whole thing. It's a tricky balance.​

But Mme.Pontmercy's questions are easy to answer. "If you'll be looking after him, I'm quite sure it's safe for him to take rooms here. I've made you a list of medicines, some instructions for care, here, if you want to look over them?" He hands over a neatly printed little pamhlet, just a few pages long. Mme. Pontmercy can read, he knows that. "And do ask any questions you have, now or later, if you find there's anything I've neglected to explain properly."

[road_to_calvary]

Valjean has his old countenance, though slightly worn by fatigue and illness. Cosette will recognise it; it is the expression behind which everything hides, placid, thoughtful, but - if one observes closely, and is used to him - edged with a little tension. He smiles, and is happy, and does not let it show that her words ease his anxiety on one hand, and sharpen it with the other.

It is not her fault. It is his. He does not know what she has learned, or how, and so cannot decide how to react to the worry. But he knows she is not running away from him, and Marius is allowing her presence, and that is all he really needs. There is pleasure too, in the way she commandeers his recovery, just as she did when he was taken with fever after he burned his arm in the Gorbeau house. That was a happy month of being at her mercy, and perhaps this will be a little like that again.

'If it is what you want, children,' he says quietly, and bows his head a little in acquiescence to the doctor's instructions.

[heartbeneathastone]

"Yes, of course it is," Marius says, looking to Cosette, not that he really needs confirmation that she agrees.

He moves forward to offer Valjean his arm (or his shoulder, if Valjean's weakness demands it) to help him up and out of the bed.

[lark_in_flight]

"Of course!" she says stoutly, and meaning it entirely.

While the men help her father up, to whatever extent help is needed, she reads over the little pamphlet quickly. It seems comprehensible; she doesn't understand the reasons for everything, but it's all explained very clearly, even the words she doesn't know. "Thank you, M. Joly. We can do this, easily. It's all perfectly clear."

[merryeccentricities]

Joly smiles at her."I'm sure you can. And I'll be easy enough to find if any questions come up. " He frowns a little as Monsieur Fauchelevent stands up. "Monsieur, I'm going to get you a chair that you can use to get back to your rooms. --Ah, no protests! You know how strange space inside Milliways can be. You'll see, the wheelchairs here are very comforable." He's already getting one of the folding transport chairs out as he speaks. "Here--" He turns it around, and flips the breaks as he does so. "--Marius, you see how the handles are , you can push it, I'm sure?"

It really is a very light, simple looking chair; nothing at all like the various awkward contraptions he'd seen sometimes in his own year.

[road_to_calvary]

Valjean has no will to object, and little pride. It is alarming how weak he feels; he who is used to feeling strong enough to carry anything. But it lacks the edge of fatality he felt just a few days, so he will trust Joly's assessment that this will not last forever.

He leans as little as he can on Marius's shoulder, knowing that it was injured and not wanting to pressure it.

'Thank you,' he says, to all of them. It seems so inadequate, but he does not know what else will do.

[heartbeneathastone]

Marius begins to edge the wheelchair tentatively forward, but waits for Cosette to lead the way.

[lark_in_flight]

She can do that! With encouraging smiles cast back at both her father and her husband, and indeed, it isn't a terribly long or difficult journey up to Valjean's Milliways rooms.

They're comfortable rooms, and she's cajoled her father into a few nicer touches here or there. But she's already thinking, as she unlocks the door, of little improvements to make for her father's comfort.

[road_to_calvary]

These quarters are far too comfortable by his standards, but when has he ever been able to deny any suggestion Cosette makes? They do not feel like any kind of home, sporadic as his visits here are, but they are familiar enough and it is no hardship to find himself brought to them. When Marius stops pushing the chair he looks around - everything is as it was; a few books, the modern things he has never touched, a wardrobe and neatly-made bed.

He is suddenly aware that it is just the three of them, and if he is well enough to be released from the doctor's supervision, there are probably other things he cannot avoid. It is what it is; he pulls himself up out of the wheelchair and eases his way onto a normal seat without looking at either of them.

'We could send a rat for coffee or tea, if one may be found in the hall,' he ventures after a moment.

[heartbeneathastone]

"I will go," Marius says at once. He glances quickly at Cosette-- does she wish to speak to her father of the things they learned? Is it too soon? Well, it seems best that she decide-- then ducks into the hall.

[lark_in_flight]

Marius ducks out, and it's only Cosette and her father.